


move toward me with the same tempo

by summerstorm



Category: Vampire Diaries (TV)
Genre: Breathplay, Community: kink_bingo, Established Relationship, F/M, Rough Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-06-24
Updated: 2011-06-24
Packaged: 2017-10-20 16:48:05
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,048
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/214908
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/summerstorm/pseuds/summerstorm
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He breathes in sharply, feeling something curl in his stomach. He wants to shake Caroline's hand off. He doesn't need her to do this. It doesn't help, for starters; all it does is raise his frustration. He's been on edge for two days now, and every time Caroline tries to be quiet and calm him down, it just makes him aware that he can't.</p>
            </blockquote>





	move toward me with the same tempo

**Author's Note:**

> This fills my breathplay square for kink-bingo. Thank you to magisterequitum for looking it over. Title from Adrienne Rich.

The first time Tyler digs the tip of his pen into a textbook hard enough to bend it, Caroline just reaches across the couch to cover his wrist with her hand, thumb circling the jutting bone. Tyler looks at her knuckles and sneaks a glance at her face; she's still absorbed in her homework, calmly drawing out numbers with a long pencil. The only tell that she's aware she's touching Tyler is the tighter rise of the thigh holding her notebook, making up for her missing hand.

He breathes in sharply, feeling something curl in his stomach. He wants to shake Caroline's hand off. He doesn't need her to do this. It doesn't help, for starters; all it does is raise his frustration. He's been on edge for two days now, and every time Caroline tries to be quiet and calm him down, it just makes him aware that he _can't_ calm down. It's not that fucking easy. His body feels like it's been wrapped in ropes and the closer the full moon gets, the tighter those ropes are pulled. He has nothing to be angry about except the fact that he fucking _is_ , for no reason, and that makes him angrier.

His pen makes another indentation in the textbook, where it shouldn't even be anyway, but he needed to keep his hands rooted somewhere. When he looks down, the tip is perpendicular to the plastic, completely useless. His fingers clutch the pen harder of their own volition, his brimming strength making it crackle without breaking until he snaps and throws it across the room, staring ahead, feeling his breathing harden. He feels like he can't control himself, like there's this current, this layer of aggressiveness boiling underneath the surface, ready to burst. It's nowhere near as painful as the transformations, but it makes him want to crawl out of his skin, be somewhere else until his body decides to start listening to him again.

Caroline doesn't touch him this time, but she sets her notebook aside and leans forward, elbows on her knees, her eyes flickering from his face to his arms to the carpet ahead like she's not sure her attention is wanted. Which is a smart thing to do, because Tyler's not even sure himself: half her looks make him want her out of his house, and when she lifts a hand to his arm, he grabs her forearm and sets it back on her thigh.

"I'm fine," he lies. The words come out through his teeth. It's so blatant he suspects it's probably worse than it would have been to say what crossed his mind first, which was _don't touch me_. But that's a lie, too, because he doesn't want her not to touch him. Caroline staying away is the last thing he wants. Times like this, half of him wants her with him, because, pathetic as it sounds, she actually knows what he's going through, and when she looks at him there's an understanding there that's comforting. The other half of him finds those looks condescending and infuriating and wants her gone. He doesn't want to deal with this part of him; why the fuck should Caroline?

Caroline's voice is soft when she says his name, all in the same breath. The vowels carry a wariness that's offset by the concern he can feel everywhere else. He leans back forcefully, slamming his body against the back of the couch, digging at the carpeting with his foot, like pressing both extremes of his body to something will restrict how far the need to hit something spreads.

Caroline hands him another pen and he takes it without a word, tossing the textbook he was using at the coffee table and switching to a half-written essay, full of margin notes from Caroline that make it unusable and enable him to practically carve words in.

It's satisfying, at least until the tip of the pen goes through the paper and the shift of Tyler's hand to pull it out is so uncontrolled it rips the paper in half.

Caroline sits up and gives him a searching-eyes, close-mouthed, judging look over her nose.

"What?" Tyler snaps, straightening up.

She sets her hands on his shoulders and presses her lips even tighter together before saying, "Fight me."

Tyler cocks his head, trying to process the words. He knows his mouth is slightly open. He knows he looks confused, but Caroline shouldn't be saying shit like that to him.

"I'm serious, Tyler," she adds. She bites her lip and shrugs before repeating, "Fight me," in this lighthearted tone, like it's a totally normal thing to say, like it's the same as suggesting they watch a movie or something.

"No." He pushes her arms off him and stands up, running the back of his hand over his forehead. "No."

"Why not?" Caroline says, flat, not expecting an answer. She's looking up at him now, eyes hopeful. "You're—clearly not okay. If you're going to end up snapping at someone, I would prefer that someone to be me."

"Well, I wouldn't," he says, as firmly as he can manage.

Caroline lets out an exasperated sigh and rises to her feet. She takes steps towards him until he steps away from her. "I get it, okay? I know what it's like to not be able to control yourself. I don't want you to get to that point if I can—"

"You can't." He turns around to head for the door, but Caroline's there already, hands around his elbows, not holding him back but ready to.

"You don't know what I was going to say."

"You can't make it _better_ ," he mocks, his voice growing tighter, "because I'm not mad at _you_." He feels the end of the sentence all the way along his spine, the dry, vibrating pain of being slammed into a wall without a second to expect it. "What the fuck, Caroline?"

His fists tighten into themselves and he takes in air, tries not to react. She wants him to react. She may be a vampire, he knows she can kick his ass, but that's not the point. This is not her fault. She shouldn't have to risk pain for it.

"Fight me," she says, her tone still even, her face the picture of calmness.

His hands are on her waist before he can think better of it, fingers curling around the fabric of her shirt. He pushes her off just so he can step closer, make it very clear that he's serious. He turns them around so she's the one pinned to the wall and looks her in the eye when he says, "Fuck me."

He doesn't expect her to laugh, but that's what she does, giddy sweet, eyes crinkling. "Tyler," she says, fond. He grits his teeth. Her mouth curls into an amused smile as she adds, "We both know that doesn't work," and this time he feels it coming when his shoulders hit the floor, feels himself stumbling backwards with Caroline's legs around his, hears her knees slam loud and dry into the carpeting at both sides of his hips.

He grabs at her arms, hands working their way up to her neck, her hair, pulling her down until she's close enough to kiss, and fuck, he wants to kiss her, wants to kiss her now that she still looks composed and clean and tidy, wants to kiss her until she doesn't.

She must sense his intentions or some shit, because one second he's licking his lips and thumbing at the end of Caroline's jaw and the next he's pressed back against the door to the study, the weight of his body making it creak as he tries to regain his balance.

"I was managing to distract myself fine there," Tyler points out.

Caroline tightens her hands on his arms and presses him further if possible into the door, until it stops moving. She's stronger than him like this. It's not close enough to the full moon to have a chance against her. Fighting him, to her, is going to be like dancing. If she lets him have the upper hand at any point it's going to be all choreography.

"A distraction," she's saying, "is like, the polar opposite of what you need. You need release."

"That's exactly what that kind of distraction usually leads to," Tyler says.

"That's not the kind of release you need."

"You may find this hard to believe," Tyler says, "but I am okay with that."

Caroline shrugs one-shouldered. "Well, I'm not," she says, and her grip vanishes.

He grabs her hips and pushes her back across the room, watching her watch him calmly, almost smiling. If she's trying to actually piss him off, she's succeeding.

He shoves harder at her hips and she lets him, lets him step closer without moving away, lets him pin her to the back of the couch with his hips. She lets him grab her hair and pull her back by it, her body bending backwards at the waist.

"I don't think you understand what you're doing," he says. It's not close enough to the full moon to be a last warning, either, both because she could stop this whenever she wanted by strength alone and because he's still human, he's not completely out of it. It's not like being a wolf; he can still make choices.

Maybe she really does know what she's doing.

He rolls his hips into her and she licks her lips, her calf coming up around the back of his knees. "I think I do," she says, reaching for his shirt, and rolls them over until he's flat on the floor, face down, and she's sitting on the back of his thighs, holding his hands behind him. Her knees squeeze his legs uncomfortably close together and pressed to the floor. He tries to spread them, fighting against the grip of her thighs, which is fucking useless until she decides to soften it and give him a chance. It should be embarrassing, and it really shouldn't be making him hard.

"It's nice of you to spread your legs for me," he says, stretching his neck to try and face her, smirk at her and not at the pattern of the carpet. It doesn't work out great; she lays her hand out over the back of his neck and presses forward before he's done speaking. She's still letting him move his legs, though.

"If you keep doing that, I'm gonna have enough room to knee you in the balls." She hums under her breath. As an afterthought, she adds, "That could be fun."

He rolls his eyes. She can't even see his face, so it's pointless, but he does anyway, and uses the arm she freed to yank hers off his head so he can turn over. He keeps his fingers on her forearm as he does, pulling her down as soon as he can, working fast to kiss her before she gets bored of giving him chances. It can't be a pleasant kiss; their teeth clack and he hangs onto her bottom lip with his teeth so she won't go away, grabs her head again, holds her down. It can't be that pleasant, but for the first time he feels her give into it, not like she's being magnanimous and humoring him but like she wants it enough to drop the fighting mask for a second.

It's easier now, so he lets go as much as he can while still touching her. He moves a hand to her waist and she sighs into his mouth, pliant enough that he doesn't have much of a problem rolling them over, or keeping a hand between her head and the floor when he does. Her legs come up around him, pulling him in, and now she's holding onto him, her hands clasped behind his head even before he leans in to kiss her again, slower this time instead of like a derailed truck. She smiles against his mouth.

"You're supposed to be fighting me," she says, soft, breathy, the last word giving way to a moan.

He closes his eyes, fighting off the urge to tell her that he isn't, that he _doesn't want to_ , that he doesn't give a fuck if he'll feel better afterwards. He still doesn't want to do it. It should be that fucking easy, and he has to press his lids tighter closed as the simmering anger in his stomach starts to boil again.

"That doesn't mean shit to me," he says, breaking away, and he sees the look on her face change for a split second before her feet are on the floor again and she's pulling herself up by the collar of his t-shirt, knuckles digging into his throat and forcing him into a kneeling position, first, and then into standing.

"I thought we'd agreed you'd humor me this one time." Caroline takes a step forward, walking him backwards until there's nowhere to go but through the wall. Her body stops moving an inch away from being pressed up against him. Her knuckles are still lightly pressed to his throat, not enough to make breathing difficult but enough to make it unpleasant.

Her gaze bounces from his face to her hand on his neck, and for some reason that air of consideration makes him go still. He hasn't really felt anywhere near relaxed in what feels like forever, but he feels the tension in his skin increase, become harder to ignore as the nail of Caroline's pinky drags across his neck, first, and then the rest of her fingers follow, extending over his throat. The touch is shallow at first, too high and too soft to be a bother, and his mouth drops open to take advantage of it, breathe in easier.

He gets about five seconds of unrestricted air before Caroline's hand tightens higher on his neck. He swallows once before he decides it's not worth swallowing again; the way Caroline's hand hinders the movement is way too uncomfortable. For a moment, she loosens the hold minimally, like she's considering letting go, but then she presses in tighter, like she's considering the possibility of—what, choking him?

He closes his mouth after the first intake of breath through it sends a weird-ass void, nauseous feeling up his throat. Inhaling through his nose works better; after a few seconds he feels on the brink of lightheadedness at the top of every breath, but Caroline isn't blocking his windpipe enough to make him dizzy—it's just enough to make every bit of air count. Enough to be almost relaxing, the way his body seems to measure the oxygen it's receiving and focusing on that instead of on the edginess he's been carrying around lately.

When Caroline's grasp tightens even more, he feels some of the tension dissipate every time he lets out air, each exhalation noisier and more embarrassing until his eyes roll back, the wallpaper scratchy against his scalp, and she pulls her fingers back.

He reaches for her wrist unconsciously, keeping her hand where it was. There's no pressure now, just his chest heaving as his lungs fill up with uncontrived oxygen, loud and labored just because he's so aware of what his throat is doing. He meets Caroline's eyes as soon as he remembers to, and she's looking at him carefully. He thinks he sees some concern under the surface of unwavering concentration, but the idea that she's this focused on him makes it ridiculously hard to look beyond that surface.

His fingers curl around her wrist, wordlessly urging it forward. "You're serious," she says, low and whispery, like she's baffled by the idea that he—okay, maybe it doesn't really follow that he wants her to control his breathing, but she's the one who put a hand around his neck in the first place. "I could—I could actually hurt you," she points out, soft, almost like she doesn't want him to hear it.

Tyler rolls his eyes, or he thinks he rolls his eyes; his face still feels kind of numb. The only sign she's noticed is the minimal tilt of her head, at first, but after a few seconds she presses her lips together into a hint of a shrug, like she's concentrating too hard to give way to a full facial expression, and uses her free hand to drag his off the one on his neck.

He sees the shift in her face, from _this is dangerous, I'm not doing this_ to the realization that at least this is something they haven't tried before; it's not like last month when she agreed to work through his anger via sex and he picked a fight with a teammate the next day anyway that ended up with a black eye and an emergency exit so the school nurse wouldn't see Tyler heal in seconds.

His breathing comes noisy to his own ears before she touches her thumb and first two fingers to his throat again, feeling for something—pressure points, something—the right spots to limit his breathing.

She finds them pretty fucking easily, or maybe he's still oxygen-deprived, because it's only a few seconds before his face starts feeling like it's stretching and completely numb at the same time, before he feels his body give into that numbness too. She keeps the pressure steady, the strings of breath he's drawing in weakening as his senses soften, vision going slightly blurry, his hearing a sort of subtle white noise that muffles what little there is to hear.

Suddenly, Caroline stumbles, stepping forward, her grip weakening, and Tyler abruptly sucks in air, feeling like he's waking up. His breathing is fucking noisy now, such a marked, disturbing change from the near silence, and he can hear Caroline gritting her teeth thoughtfully, can hear the rough drag of her jeans along his thighs as she touches her knee a spot on the wall between his legs. She's pressing up against him.

She's pressing up against him and all he can think about is how much he wants her to be naked, how much he wants _her_. It's like all the pent-up aggressiveness has turned into straightforward want—that he can't even act on because he—can't. Because her fingers are still curled around his neck, closing in again, and he wants her to ask. Wants her to start it.

The last breath he takes before her fingers obstruct his windpipe again is ridiculous; he feels it all the way down his body, feels everything that's going on: the heaviness in his chest, his stomach relaxing and contracting with effort, how hard he is and how fucking tight his pants are, so tight it almost hurts. He tries to reach a hand to undo them, but his arm seems to move slowly, cooperate only as far as his thigh. He lets his hand rest there, float there, and tries to pay attention to Caroline as he breathes in trickles of air, feeling his diaphragm acutely, like it's swaying wildly even though it's physically impossible that that's actually happening. She's watching even more intently now, with an intensity that's less assessing and more—selfish, selfish like she's enjoying this too.

She moves her thigh up against him and he makes an effort to clutch her hips. The shift lets in enough oxygen to hear things again, to hook his thumbs around belt loops and curl his fingers around the waistband, feeling skin. When she starts rocking her hips into him, she's barely choking him; her fingers are soft, and there's a calmness in them and in him that's—it's not even just nice; it gives him this sense of clarity that Tyler doesn't remember feeling in—doesn't even remember feeling at all, and there's a clarity in Caroline's face, too, beneath the messy hair from throwing him around, a small cut on her jaw that's not done healing yet, a fading bruise on her shoulder, visible under her stretched-out collar.

She's not the only one who's bruised; when Caroline moves the hand on his throat, the first thing she does is poke at some point low on the back of his neck, sending jolts of coated-down pain down his spine until he hisses and his hips jerk.

Her hand moves to his shoulder and she steps closer in, plastering herself to him. He can feel her breasts on his chest, their legs almost tangled together. She smiles at him like she's amused and he tries to get his jeans open again, but she grabs his wrist this time, shaking her head and pushing her thigh higher up between his. He tries not to grind down on her leg, tries not to be that desperate, but it takes a fuck ton of effort, and it doesn't help that she laces her fingers through his and brings his hand to her stomach, like she's going to take her time.

"Fuck," he grunts, and she smiles a little wider, a little thinner as she moves his hand again, this time leaving it over his fly, cupping him through the fabric. It's not even a relief—it's still painful, still too tight.

Caroline's voice is high when she says, "I've never seen you come in your pants."

He narrows his eyes, starting to feel the strain of holding back now that the lightheadedness is fading. "You don't want to see that."

"I kind of do."

He groans. "And you think now's a good time?"

"It could be," she says, and undoes a few buttons on his shirt, enough to slide a hand under it, up to his ribs. Her other hand touches his neck again, testing points with the tips of her index and middle finger. He's so focused on that hand he doesn't even move his own, doesn't open his pants, doesn't do any of the things he was thinking about five seconds ago.

Caroline seems fascinated.

"The last time I saw you concentrate this much you were punching somebody," she says, which explains some of that. "I like this better." He raises his eyebrows, gives her the best blank look he can manage. "Hey, don't talk back," she responds, her mouth curling around the words like she's testing them out, and the light touches on his neck turn into a soft hold.

When she tightens it, he can feel the way his stomach heaves irregularly and harder as his heartbeat speeds up. It makes him nervous, which makes his heart go faster, fucking vicious circle. He tries to measure his breathing, slow it down, make each inhale deeper, but it only results in his lungs rebelling against him and making him hyperventilate.

She lets go. The breath he lets out is pretty much a long, dry sigh, his body almost doubling over with the effort. Caroline doesn't move when his face brushes her shoulder, or when he keeps it there, nuzzling at her collarbone. His hand is brushing against her side now, barely there, and she's still touching his ribs, and it's good. It's relaxing, at least until her hand moves down his stomach to undo his fly.

A surprised laugh comes out of her mouth when he grasps her breast, and she gasps when he squeezes, nearly whines when the base of his thumb runs over her nipple even through two layers of clothing and a padded bra. It makes him wonder how much she's masking right now, how turned on she is, because she's not usually this responsive.

He tries to stand straight again, and manages to regain some balance, enough to rest his head on the wall again and push his hips forward into her hand. It's not close enough; he needs her to touch him, to do more than slide her palm shallowly over his boxers.

She touches his chin then, lifting it until he focuses his eyes on her. Her fingertips move down his neck, the outer edges, reassuring, massaging. "Ready?" she asks, biting her lip.

The only thing he can manage is a blink and a quick nod, and then the air's limited again, and it goes to his head immediately. His eyes stay open, but she's blurry and his hearing is numbed down and he can't focus on more than one thing at a time. What occupies his full attention is the drag of his jeans down his hips, the way they stay up mid thigh—her knee holding them there. He's lightheaded and numb and she's not close enough and he _needs_ her to touch him, or to push her knee higher, do _something_ , but instead her hand moves up to his ribs. She watches him as his eyes water and his ribs contract, watches him with a hand over his ribs, her thumb stroking, like she's making sure he's still—capable of breathing or something, and he doesn't—he doesn't care, he just wants her to stop being careful and touch his dick before he passes out.

It's hardly soon enough when she does, the heel of her hand pushing the elastic of his underwear down over his cock. She doesn't take it off or even tug it down; the fabric rubs along his length in time with her hand, and then she lets go of his neck and oxygen rushes in, sudden and so fucking necessary at this point. She gives his cock an awkward, upward jerk, his boxers springing up behind her hand, and his hips go a little crazy, fucking into her loose fist as his hands tighten their hold on her, on her hip, on her chest, and he breathes in deep and comes at the same time, his body shaking wildly with the effort.

She's laughing softly as he comes down from that and begins to take in his surroundings. It feels like the rest of the room wasn't there before, like his entire life went out of focus and he's relearning it now, remembering what day it is and what he was doing before Caroline took it upon herself to get rid of his anger. Slowly, his breathing steadies, and Caroline shifts her weight from foot to foot, and wipes her hand on his boxers, and looks at him like she's trying not to.

This time he pushes her backwards without prompting, back until she hits the arm of a couch and her legs bend over it, body falling back on the cushions. He falls to his knees awkwardly—he doesn't have the energy to be graceful about this—and she makes a noise that's half sigh, half long groan as he yanks her pants and underwear down her legs, off her feet.

As soon as they're free to, her legs just fall open. She's mumbling something, a weird mix of his name and actual sentences spoken too fast for him to understand and he swears he catches a _yes, please_ at one point. He bites at her thigh, a little concerned he's going to hurt her if he goes straight for her pussy, and she pushes her hips up as he rubs his hands over her hipbones. She's squirming, which is kind of amazing, and for a second there he wants her to keep squirming, considers it, and then realizes he's not capable of waiting that long and his tongue is on her in seconds flat.

She's still for a moment when he starts to spread her open with his tongue, like—like maybe she's embarrassed; she gets like that sometimes, when she's wet like this, like there's some world in which he doesn't fucking love it, but then she's rocking her hips against his mouth and her thighs are spreading even more even though one of her leg's buried into the back of the couch and her other leg's stretching down to the floor, as far as it will go without leaving the height of the couch arm completely.

He grabs her hips and pulls her further in, and then sneaks a hand between her legs, pinching a line up her thigh before slipping two fingers inside her, his thumb opening out her lips to make it easier to flick his tongue over her clit. He's vaguely aware he's making noise, groaning as he licks at her, and he doesn't give a fuck, not when he can concentrate on things like Caroline grabbing at his hair and repeating words over and over, saying, "Fuck, fuck, Tyler, fuck you, fuck," completely void of anger. At one point her voice breaks halfway through a word, becomes a cry, and her hand tightens and her gasps become tinier, a little pained. She tastes so fucking good he has to make an effort to pull back, his mouth still slick as it stumbles up her pelvis, sucking at the soft skin low on her stomach.

He drags himself around the couch, still on his knees, keeping a hand on Caroline and sliding it underneath her shirt when he's close enough, under her bra. He buries his face in her collarbone, breathing her in until her belly starts vibrating with a giddy sort of laughter. Her hand comes around his side and he feels her pull his jeans up.

"Ugh," she says, "I need a shower," but doesn't make a move to get up. "You should come with me."

He lifts his chin to face her and ends up kissing her jaw instead of looking at her as he speaks. "What if I break something," he says, teeth grazing her neck. "Wouldn't be the first time."

"Can you even get up?"

He touches his lips to her ear and says, "Yeah," clipped. He's not entirely convinced he can. He's not convinced he wants to, but he's also not convinced he can, which is ridiculous. There's a full moon in two days. He's supposed to be brimming with energy.

He fucking hates brimming with full moon energy. This is so much better.

"So you won't break anything then," she says cheerily, and sighs as she lets her head drop back. "Okay, I'll give you a couple of minutes."

"Generous," he mutters, and climbs up over her to kiss her properly.


End file.
